Members of the Steering Committee (2016-2018)

Arja Voipio

TGEU Co-Chair

Arja Voipio, based in Finland, joined TGEU’s Steering Committee as Treasurer in 2012 and became Co-Chair in 2014. Arja holds an M.Sc. in Economics and Business Administration. In her professional life she works in the public sector. She has been active in the trans and LGBTI movements in Finland for a number of years. She has served e.g. as the vice-chair of Trasek, the chair of Heseta and the chair of the trans-working group of Seta. All these Finnish human rights NGOs are member organisations of TGEU.

Alecs Recher

Alecs Recher, born in 1975 and based in Switzerland, joined TGEU’s Steering Committee as Secretary in 2012 and became Co-Chair in 2014. Alecs holds a Diploma in Remedial Education and Social Pedagogy and a Master’s Degree in Law. In his professional life, he works as a legal researcher for the Swiss Centre of Expertise in Human Rights. As an activist, he was engaged in gay rights on a national level before he founded the Swiss trans organisation Transgender Network Switzerland (TGNS). Today, he’s the head of the TGNS free legal advice centre. From 2004 to 2014, Alecs was an elected Member of Parliament in the City of Zurich.

Alecs Recher stepped down from his position as Co-Chair of TGEU in December 2016.

Clémence Zamora-Cruz

Co-Chair

Clémence Zamora-Cruz, member of the Steering Committee since 2015, is a transfeminist activist of Mexican origin and French nationality. She has worked for many years for the rights of the LGBTI community in France. She worked as a radio presenter for a few years on the report “Clemence in Wonderland” within the program “Sid’Aventures”, fighting against transphobia and denouncing the discrimination that the LGBTI community suffers in France. She was Vice President of the Les Myriades Trans Association. Clémence acts as co-president of Acceptess-T, spokeswoman and trans officer for Inter-LGBT, and is active in the Paris International Tournament. In her professional work, Clémence is a teacher.

Tina Orban

TGEU Co-Chair

Krisztina Kolos Orban, born in 1976 and based in Hungary, joined TGEU’s Steering Committee as Treasurer in 2014. Krisztina Kolos has been active in the LGBT movement on the national level since 2005 before the founding of Transvanilla Transgender Association in 2011. Krisztina Kolos is serving as one of the vice presidents of Transvanilla, the only active NGO focusing only on trans issues in Hungary.

Arian Kajtezović

Co-Chair

Arian Kajtezović was born in 1986 in Croatia, and holds a teaching degree in mathematics and physics, as well as a magisterial degree in computer science and mathematics. Arian spent many years of his life living in Canada and Bosnia and Herzegovina before moving back to Croatia in 2010, where he has been actively working on advancing trans* rights since 2011, being involved in the founding of Trans Aid in early 2012. He is currently one of three Co-chairs of Trans Aid. Arian has been on TGEU's Steering Committee since 2013 and became the Secretary in 2014. In 2017 Arian became the Treasurer of TGEU, and in 2018 one of the Co-Chairs. He aspires to dedicate much of his life working to achieve and ensure the highest standards of human rights for persons of all gender identities and gender expressions.

Stein Wolff Frydenlund

Treasurer

Stein Wolff Frydenlund, born in 1957 in Norway, joined the TGEU Steering Committee in 2014. Stein holds a Master’s degree in administration and organisation theory. In his professional life, he works as a lecturer in social sciences and the Norwegian language. As an activist, he was engaged in LGBT rights on a regional level for many years. He is also a member of the Amnesty International LGBTI network, both in Norway and at the international level. Today he is the head of the trans political committee of the Norwegian LGBT organisation – LLH.

Ulrika Westerlund

TGEU Secretary

Ulrika Westerlund was born in 1972 in Stockholm, where she still lives. She was the president of RFSL, The Swedish federation of LGBTQ rights 2010-2016, where she focused on trans*rights, rights for asylum seeking LGBTQ people and family politics. For example Ulrika worked to remove the forced sterilization as a requirement for legal gender recognition in Sweden (law change in 2013), improved parental rights for trans*people and improved access to gender reaffirming health care. She has also been involved in the Advocacy Network of ILGA Europe.

Ulrika is also on the board of the Swedish section of Amnesty International, and she is a member of the European Economic and Social Committee.

Ulrika has a bachelor's degree in humanities, as well as a degree in journalism. She has worked for example as a freelance journalist, editor of a feminist magazine, project manager of an LGBTQ project at the public authority Living History Forum and as a secretary to a public investigation committee on diversity in the cultural sector.

Vreer Verkerke

J. Vreer Verkerke ("vreer" roughly translates to "mixter") is on board of TGEU's Steering Committee since 2012. Nationally they started out helping a trans support group in the 1990s, founded a semi-support, semi-action group (Noodles) in 2001, co-founded Transgender Netwerk Nederland in the following years and were TNN's first advocacy officer. In their daily work, they is doing (LGB)TI related human rights education and advocacy, among others through trainings and lectures. Since 2012, they focus strongly on depathologising trans* health care and forms part of GATE's ICD expert working group. With Principle 17 (after the Yogyakarta principle on the right to health) they intervene in the Dutch trans* health politics in order to finally have respectful and quality trans* specific health care.

Nicole De Leo

Nicole De Leo, lives in Bologna, and was born in 1958 in Italy. She graduated from the the Duse Studio Performing School in Rome, and in her professional life she works as an actress.

Nicole was elected to the TGEU Steering Committee at the Council in Bologna in June 2016, and had been a participant at the Vienna & Malmö councils on behalf of M.I.T (Movimento Identità Transessuale) where she developed her experiencce in trans activism.

As an activistNicole has been carrying out mediation as a peer-educator on a project with sex-workers, with a particular study which collects data of in-door sex-work. She also takes care of counseling inside M.I.T. in regards to health-care, access to work and with particular attention to surgical issues.

She was involved in Cultural and artistic experiences such as organization of DIVERGENTI Transgender Film Festival in Bologna, performances, and readings connected to promote a different image of transsexual/transgender reality.

Nicole can speak Italian, English, French, and German.

Toryn Glavin

Toryn Glavin was born in 1994 in Dublin, a city which she still calls home. She studied for a B.Sc. in Event Management and during her time in university was a founding member of the Irish Trans Student Alliance (ITSA). Toryn continued to run ITSA for over 3 years, supporting trans students and young people, before leaving the organisation in December 2016. Toryn has been employed by Transgender Equality Network Ireland (TENI) since March 2016 as their full time Administrative Officer. She currently sits on the Gender Recognition Review Group convened by TENI, which bring together experts with an aim to advise government on how to improve Irish gender recognition legislation. She offers a youth perspective to the group.